Construction economics uses economic theories, concepts, and analytical tools to investigate issues and topics related to the construction and maintenance of the built environment by firms, industries, and projects.
Construction Economics provides students with the principles and concepts underlying the relationship between economic theory and the construction industry. The new approach adopts the argument that economics is central to government initiatives on sustainable construction.
Construction economics, like its mainstream pure economics, is concerned with the allocation of scarce resources. This is much more complex than it appears. While most of the world’s resources (land, labor, capital, firms, and other factors of production) are finite, people’s wants are infinite. In other words, at any given point in time, we are faced with two problems: the stock of resources is constant and many want sexist. This problem is formally called scarcity.
About the Book
This book is written for students from a variety of backgrounds, including architecture, surveying, civil engineering, mechanical engineering, structural engineering, construction studies, project management, real estate management, property development, conservation, and even economics. While economics students may be able to skip over the standard analysis, it should be noted that in many ways the construction industry is quite different from other economic sectors. An important purpose of this text is to highlight these differences and the unique nature of the construction industry.
This first chapter outlines the main characteristics of firms involved in the construction market and introduces the complexity of the construction process and the diversity of activities. As you read through this chapter, you will notice that there are a number of ways to describe the construction industry.